Merry Christmas.....after a VERY long Hiatus!

So....I'm back. I know, I know.......you must be thinking, "Yeah right, we'll see how long this lasts......I give it a week!" But I promise you, I have very good motive to get back on the blogging train....that motive being my husband. I must admit, I lacked motivation this past year to blog for some reason. I don't know if it was due to all the changes in my life or just the fact that I did not want to take the time to write. Perhaps I was just being lazy. Whatever it was, I'm committed to writing at least once a week this coming year while Jonathan sits in the sandbox of Bahrain.

I thought that a Christmas posting would be a good time for my comeback:) Evalynn and I have been with my parents in Colorado this past month. We have thoroughly enjoyed ourselves and my family has done a spectacular job of distracting us from the pain of Jon's absence. We are truly blessed. My Dad, brothers and sister, Hannah, came up to Collbran yesterday afternoon to spend the night at my Mom's. The only person we were missing was my Step-mom, Kathie who stayed home in Rifle to dutifully watch two dogs. We sorely missed her, but it was so great to have everyone else together. Coming from a split family, I can't tell you how nice it is to see my two families together. What an incredible, crazy, beautiful family I have. Unto the day....... Now I like warm weather as much as anyone, but I must admit, one of the reasons I wanted to be in Colorado this year, was because I wanted Evalynn to have a white Christmas, just like I did as a little girl. To my dismay, the Western Slope has been experiencing warmer than average temperatures this year and snow is hard to come by right now. Thankfully my Mom and Andy knew of where to get some, so yesterday we took the family up the road to get Eva in her snowsuit and on a sled. She LOVED it! It was a great little outing of sled riding and Argo driving (Argos are like big snowmobiles that don't go too fast). We followed it up with chili and hanging out and a game of Settlers of Catan.

This morning was a beautiful time of coffee drinking, making breakfast and opening presents. Evalynn was really getting the hang of tearing paper and had so much fun testing out all of her noise makers. She also chose today to start pulling herself up on her feet. thankfully we had about five cameras in constant rotation today, so we got lots of pictures showing off her new skill. It's very exciting stuff. We also got to chat with Jon very briefly via skype which was the best gift of all.........Well.....there is one gift that tops that, and that would be my awesome Savior, Jesus Christ. Thank you God for the greatest gift of all, one that I could never return or equal.

I will post pictures tomorrow, but tonight, I will simply say, "Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!"